Poem #36

Since your tress slipped into the Breeze's playful hand

my melancholic heart lies cracked in two by sorrow's brand.

Your magic eye is sorcery's own dark art and spell

yet know this much: the manuscript has fallen ill.

Within your tress's curve that darkling mole, oh say, what is't?

A soot-dark dot that in the ring of letter jim exists.

Your musk-dark tress within your cheek's own paradise of light

a peacock that in heaven's garden made delighted flight.

My heart, desiring your face, O solace of my soul

is roadside dust that to the playful Breeze did roll.

Like dust this earthen frame can never rise again

it fell so hard before the threshold of your lane.

Your stature's shadow casts across my frame, O Christlike breath

a spirit's glow fallen on bones long pledged to death.

He who called only Kaaba home, by memory of your sip

I saw him settle at the tavern door, a steadfast tip.

Lost Hafez with your grief, dear friend, maintains

a union sealed within the ancient covenant's remains.